Overtaken by a Sand-Storm.
The tormenting thirst which I experienced after my second
disappointment simply beggars description. To say that I felt as if
my entire internal system were becoming parched is only to put it
mildly. But, however excruciating the torture might be, there was no
help for it after all but to move on in the hope of finding some water;
even the hope itself was now almost deserting me. I really felt that
I should die of thirst if I should fail to get some moisture during
the rest of the day, and were to pass another night waterless. I had
been constantly taking some _hotan_; but even that cooling fragrance
seemed to increase the distressing dryness. Thank heaven! about eleven
o’clock I came within sight of a declivity, and somehow I felt sure
that I should find some water at its bottom. Buḍḍha be praised! I was
right: there was some water. But alas! such water! To take the luggage
off my back, get out a wooden bowl, and run down into the hollow was
the work of an instant. But when I fetched out a bowlful of the water,
lo and behold! it was vermilion red, thick and (what was worse) alive
with myriads of little creatures! In short, it was a stagnant pool of
water, which for all I knew might have been becoming putrid for years.
Imagine how I then felt! I was dying with thirst, but the very look
of the water was forbidding. Then my religious scruples disallowed
my swallowing any water with living things in it. It was not long,
however, before I remembered a teaching of the Blessed Buḍḍha, in
which the Lord telleth that when water which is to be drunk contains
living things, it should be strained through a piece of woven stuff. I
went through the process; but the water remained red. There were no
more moving things in it, however, and I took a good long draught of
the vermilion liquid. That quenching draught, how delicious it was! I
imagine God’s nectar could not be sweeter. But a second bowlful--no, I
could not take it. In the usual manner, then, I built a fire and went
about boiling the filtered water. It was well-nigh twelve o’clock,
however, before the kettle began to boil, and it being against my rule,
as already told, to take any meal after noon, I prepared baked flour
with the red lukewarm water. And the lunch I then took was one of the
most enjoyable I ever had in Tibet.
[Illustration: A SAND-STORM.]
I had proceeded over the sandy desert for about two and a half miles,
after that memorable lunch, and it was now past three o’clock in the
afternoon, when a terrific sand-storm arose. A sand-storm is something
which one can never experience, or form any idea of, in Japan. As
strong gust after gust of wind arose, the loose sand actually surged
into big billows, tossing, dashing, tumbling, and sweeping, like the
angry waves of the mighty ocean. The wind burrowed deep into the ground
here and built high hills of sand there, filling the air with blinding
particles, which rested in heaps on the luggage, penetrated down the
neck, and made impossible any progress forward, while to stand still
was to risk being buried alive. Not knowing what else to do, I kept
moving just to shake off the sand, and to avoid being inhumed, while
reciting in silence some passages of the Holy Text.
Fortunately the storm lasted for only about an hour, and it subsided
with the same suddenness with which it arose. Then I resumed my
advance, and by about five o’clock I reached a place grown over with
creeping grass, and low thorny bush, the leaves of which were not green
but dark to almost blackness, owing probably to the cold climate. There
I bivouacked for the night, and I had an abundance of fuel with which
to make a fire, and afterwards thoroughly enjoyed my sleep, as I had
not done for many a night.
The next morning, after traversing the bush-land, I came to the foot
of a mountain which I had to climb. When half way up the slope I saw
a mountain stream flowing across my road, and it presented a rather
curious sight. For the river, at a very short distance, broadened into
a lake, and almost described a right angle when flowing out of this
and into another basin. Afterwards I ascertained the name of this
river to be Chema-yungdung-gi-chu, and that its waters flowed into the
Brahmapuṭra. I shuddered at the thought of having once more to cross an
icy mountain stream, but there was no help.
It was only nine o’clock in the morning when I reached the
Chema-yungdung-gi-chu, and I found ice quite thick still along its
banks. I waited till the ice began to melt, and I finished the
noon-meal before making a plunge into the water, not forgetting of
course the anointing process. My intention was to make my sheep carry
their shares of the luggage across the river; but to this proposal they
strenuously objected, probably knowing instinctively the depth of the
water. In the end I gave in, relieved the animals of their burden, and,
leaving the luggage behind, I led them into the water by their ropes.
I tucked up my clothes high, but the water proved to be much deeper
than I had judged; it came up to my shoulders, and all the clothing
I had on became wet through. The sheep proved good swimmers, and we
managed to get to the other side without any accident; of course they
might have been washed down and drowned, but for the assistance I gave
them by means of the ropes. Once on the bank, I tied one end of the
ropes to a large boulder, and after taking off all my clothing to get
dry I, stark naked, made a second plunge and returned for my luggage.
The second crossing was comparatively easy. After a rest of about
half an hour, and a thorough anointing for the second time, I made
all my baggage into one bundle to be balanced on my head. With that
acrobatic equipment, I entered the stream for a third time. All went
well, until, in mid-stream, I lost my foothold, treading on a slippery
stone in the bottom, and, what with the weight of the luggage on my
head, and more or less exhaustion after the repeated wadings, I fell
down into the water, while the bundle slid off my head. I had no time
even to bring my staff into service; all I could do was to take firm
hold of my luggage, and try to swim with one hand; for I was being fast
carried down into deep waters. The thought then occurred to me that, if
I tried to save my luggage, I might lose my life. But a second thought
made it plain to me that to lose my luggage would mean surer death,
because my route lay for ten days, at least, over an uninhabited tract
of wilderness, and thus it was wiser to cling to it while life lasted.
And cling to my luggage I did, but I was rapidly losing the power of
moving my free swimming arm, and, in only one hundred yards down the
swift stream, I should be washed into one of the lakes, whence I might
never be able to get to dry land. I should have said that the river,
at the point where I was crossing it, was a hundred and eighty yards
wide, more or less. I had now had quite a course of ice and water--all
involuntarily certainly--and a feeling of numbness was quickly coming
over me. I began to think that it might be just as well to be drowned
then as to die of starvation afterwards. In fact, I had spoken my
last desire: “O ye! All the Buḍḍhas of the ten quarters, as well as
the highest Teacher of this world, Buḍḍha Shākyamuni! I am not able
to accomplish my desires and to return the kindness of my parents,
friends, followers and specially the favors of all the Buḍḍhas, in
this life; but I desire that I be born again, in order to requite the
favors which I have already received from all.” At that moment, with a
thrill, I felt that the end of one of my staves had touched something
hard. In an instant courage returned to me, and on trying to stand up I
found that the water was only up to my breast. I was at that time about
forty yards from the bank I had started for. Feeble as I was, with
recovered strength I finally managed to reach the “shore of salvation”.
As for the luggage, heavy with the soaking water, it was impossible for
me to rebalance it on my head, and I pulled it along after me in the
water; but when I at last got upon the bank, it taxed all my remaining
energy to drag it out after me. Arrived on the bank, I found that I had
been carried more than two hundred and fifty yards down the stream from
the point whence I started to cross it, and I saw my sheep leisurely
grazing, perfectly unconscious of their master’s sad plight. I had no
strength, then, even to crawl up to where my sheep were. My fingers
were stiff and immovable, and I rubbed the regions over my heart and
lungs with closed fists. After an hour’s exercise of this kind, I more
or less recovered the circulation of blood in my limbs, and I was just
able partially to undo my baggage and to take out hotan--hotan, my
life-saving hotan, which Mrs. Ichibei Watanabe of Osaka gave me, when
bidding me farewell. A dose of hotan sent me into a fit of convulsions,
which lasted for nearly three hours. It was now past five o’clock, and
the sun was going down. The convulsions had almost left me. I then made
two bundles of my luggage, and in two crawling trips I carried them to
where I had left my sheep grazing. It was then that I thought of an
ancient method of torture, called _Oi-ishi_, which consisted in making
a suspect carry on his back an extremely heavy load--so rackingly heavy
I then felt to be the weight of my divided luggage. That evening I had
neither courage nor energy to make any fire, and I passed the night
wrapped up in my half-wet _tuk-tuk_. The luggage having been done up
in hides and skins, the water had not penetrated much into it, and I
was thus able to go to sleep dressed, and protected in partially dry
apparel.
[Illustration: STRUGGLE IN THE RIVER.]